


Down with the King

by ShiHeTsu



Series: In Our Dreams [1]
Category: Durarara!!
Genre: Dream World, Feudal Era, M/M, Shingen's experiments, Trauma, inspired by a MV
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-09
Updated: 2020-06-09
Packaged: 2021-03-04 02:26:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,347
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24626206
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShiHeTsu/pseuds/ShiHeTsu
Summary: He reached with his hand to a pockets of his trousers. With his fingers he picked on a metal buckle, he pulled a string letting it hang in front of his eyes. Black bowtie was swaying from side to side mocking his vision. Izaya fell on his seat and while staring at a ceiling he was wondering: How, the hell, he ended up here?Inspired by a new MV. Guess which one :)
Relationships: Heiwajima Shizuo/Orihara Izaya
Series: In Our Dreams [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1829506
Comments: 11
Kudos: 22





	Down with the King

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoyed it. I wrote this story yestarday and fixed mistakes today but by all means tell me what you think.  
> Someone figured out on what I based a story? :D
> 
> Maybe some Beta could help me with next one?

Izaya looked around interior of a car from his passenger’s seat. All other places were empty and windows were covered in dust from outside, almost completely cutting the sun light. On a dashboard he could see Kine’s favorite brand of smokes. No ache in his arms or side was bothering him, beside a picking at his tight. He reached with his hand to a pockets of his trousers. With his fingers he picked on a metal buckle, he pulled a string letting it hang in front of his eyes. Black bowtie was swaying from side to side mocking his vision. Izaya fell on his seat and while staring at a ceiling he was wondering: How, the hell, he ended up here?

*

Izaya was leaving a safe haven of Osaka to visit Tokyo few times a year. Shibuya Station was the first one so he never even passed Ikubukuro or Shinjuku Station, let alone streets of those cities. He never wanted to go to one of well know places. He could spend his time with his sisters anywhere, and at the beginning with him using a wheelchair, anywhere else than in a city where monsters roamed on streets was good enough.

At the beginning him and twins have been picking less populated and wide open spaced like a Meiji Shirne with its wide paths and green separating them from the city. With him slowly standing more stable on his two feet, they decided on more crowded places like markets and tiny restaurants scattered all over the district. One time he took them for small shopping and while they presented themselves in different outfits, he was stepping from one foot to the other to less a strain on muscles of his unused legs.

Izaya never told Mairu or Kururi where he was spending rest of the year. He knew that their claims of hatred had the same bit as his own indifference over them but somewhere between them was unspoken agreement on keeping their inner worries about whereabouts hidden deep in their hearts. Izaya was no fool, with his line of work people around him could be targeted as first to get to him. So that made him place them in Ejirou’s dojo. He could thank for that, even though he never did it, to Sharaku’s younger sister he used to know in school, Mikage. She never truly left him, always there when he turned her way. Long gone was an adoration in her eyes from high school and it turned to calculating stare.

Izaya let all the unwanted memories and long moments from his past slip with a shake of his head falling tiredly on a chair in a small restaurant and picking up a menu card. He was once again in hole in a wall near Harajuku waiting for his siters. He never contact or met anyone else. He didn’t need anyone else, he build a fairly simple and quite life for himself in Osaka, savoring his early retirement to fullest.

“Iza-nii!” he could hear cheerful chirp from behind him. He didn’t even turned to the entrance still going over a list of appetizers and main courses. Nothing too fancy it seems. “Iza-nii!” called a voice closer to him to finally boom into his ear few centimeters from it. “So rude! You should reply when someone is calling you!” she scolded to what he looked at her with raised eyebrow. They have long outgrown their school uniforms, not freshmen in university from which Izaya dropped out on his last semester- there was no need for him to actually graduate. But with twins it was different. He tried to lead them out of the way he knew shouldn’t be taken in the first place. One last call on his manipulations towards them.

“I could hear you perfectly fine in the first place” he replied in a bored tone.

“We brought someone” Mairu added with a big grin stretching her lips in so familiar to him way. Only then he looked behind him to pass Mairu and later Kururi standing in a line on a narrow aisle between tables.

“Hello, Izaya-kun” greeted Shinra with his hand raised up in a salute. His face adored a smile as always if not a bit strained. He left his annoying lab coat to more timid brown tweet blazer with hair shorter, barely mussing his ears.

Izaya stood up with a help of a table and back of his chair. He picked his hoodie from a bench beside him with material of his wear dangerously slipped from his fingers hoovering over a floor. The phantom pain run down from his arms to a back of his spine. The only way out was through unexpected party and knowing his sisters it would be full-fledged fight, he was in no condition to win. Even with a lost chances he pushed himself past them hearing a protest of louder of them and with his aching arm pushing a doctor nearly tripping him into a table with unsuspected patrons. But before his hand lost a contact with Shinra’s shoulder he felt a grip around his wrist. Izaya looked up with his eyes squirmed into slits. Rude comment ready on his tongue to spat like a venom to help with his retreat.

“I need your help, Izaya-kun” Shinra said with desperation that Izaya could feel on skin of his wrist, a tight hold has done no help for his slowly raising anxiety.

“That would be first” he hissed and trying to jerk his hand from a firm hold.

“Ne! Iza-nii! Let’s eat” Mairu sing-songed and with Kururi on Izaya’s other side they pushed him to a bench that his hoodie was occupying before. Each one of them sat on a side of a table and Shinra taking a chair on the opposite side of Izaya looking at him over his square glasses-frame. “I want some gyoza! What do you want Kuru-nee?!” she chirped ignoring a tense air between two friends. “Iza-nii?” she turned to her brother lowering a menu.

“I lost my appetite” he mummed crossing arms of his chest.

“Oh! That’s a pity” she said without any concern into her voice and turned to look for a waitress. “Over here!” she waved a hand over her head but the stuff was already occupied with other tables.

“I need your help, Izaya-kun” Shinra repeated leaning with his hands on a slab.

“I think I already expressed no desire in that” words were passing Izaya’s lips with bits of patience he was still having in him.

“It’s about Shizuo-kun!” and that was a last straw Izaya needed to once again rush to his feet. Looming over a small table he started at Shinra with fire smoldering in his dark carmine eyes.

“You’re coming here” the former informant could taste a fire on his breath feeling like a dragon ready to split it at any moment. “Using my sisters” he hit a surface with a fist wobbling a bottle of soy sauce and metal cup with wooden chopsticks. “To ask me to help this…man” he finished not feeling ready to describe his former enemy as a monster anymore. “How dare you show your face here? After years!” he took a much needed inhale to not burst his lungs under a pressure in his chest. “Let me guess” he let an empty laugh. “Is your Celty-chan so worried for her bestie that you decided to turn to the last person you would actually ask for help?” he left a question hanging there for a moment.

“Actually” Shinra started leaving his fearful expression letting it fall and give Izaya his passive face.” As a matter of fact, yes” he admitted without any remorse. “She is worried and you know well that I cannot let it happen” his face was serious with more like a boredom in his brown eyes. “You cannot blame me for your actions” he said and that hit Izaya taking him aback. “It was you who wanted to end things that way and you cannot deny it. And because of that” Shinra fixed his glasses on a bridge of his nose. “You finally ruined Shizuo-kun as you wanted since the beginning. But you never actually realize how damaged you’ll get in a process, too.”

Izaya let him say these words. He let him because he knew that the truth needed to be said at least once by someone. And who would not be a better person than Shinra to stab Izaya with each sentence. Maybe that was why Izaya let Shinra become his friend, for the man had a way of knowing what was inside Izaya’s head because his own head was as twisted as the former informant’s. Izaya bit an inside of his cheek letting sharp teeth cut into a tender flesh.

“You found acknowledgment you’ve been looking for but you’re still not satisfied with it” Shinra glanced with a flash reflecting in his glasses. “So here I am, as a friend, to give you an opportunity to actually do it right” he finished with a hiss.

Izaya could feel his whole body trembling, not sure if it was a strain in his back or words that were shaking his whole person. He moved from a bench squeezing behind Mairu and pushing her more to the table. He left without a words feeling a limp dragging behind him.

*

For next three months, the meeting with Shinra kept going over and over through Izaya’s head. He was sitting in his moderate apartment that was so silent that the annoying ticking noise from a wall clock could be heard. In his hand a cellphone and finger hoovering over Mairu’s contact on a list. Izaya knew that Shinra picked on the change that shook everything that Izaya created out of himself. Shinra was the only person, besides his siters, that saw the change in him during middle-school, when the mad doctor crashed a shell around the future info broker himself. And he witnessed the downfall of a man he made that with almost his fingertips could reach a sky. Izaya’s greediness was his own demise. His craving after ambition, knowledge and desire to always be right. And in his twisted point of view he saw Heiwajima Shizuo as everything that he tried to leave behind himself.

Because without Izaya, Shizuo would still be a stable, oblivious human who would get up after each of his failures. And Izaya even though admired it at the beginning he started to hate it with all his heart. And that was because he had hated himself in the first place when mighty Orihara has been born in a place of a silent, never understood kid. But neither to say, Shinra saw him as he was, as he supposed to be from the start. Still silent and misunderstood crawling to survive in his dull life. And that had been his last four years since he last saw Shizuo. Since all that he left in Ikebukuro Izaya was still misjudged and terrified of himself being pushed back to his old life.

He made a call.

“Mairu, I had few things in a city I need to take care of” he lied lightly for yet another reason to meet them. “I was wondering if you fancy a dinner? Ask your sister if that’s ok with her retaking exams” Izaya said bragging on keeping tabs on them.

“No need to rub salt into a wound” she chided. “She should be fine, she had expected a different seat with a sample questions. Can we bring Shinra-san?” she added as if firing back at her brother.

“That” he gritted his teeth. “Would be unnecessary.”

“But you know you want to!” she whined.

“That’s what Kuriri says?” he teased. “Being blunt doesn’t suit you” he said mussing his hair.

“We will send you an address!” with that a twin finished a call.

Izaya looked at a dark screen. “Brat.”

He didn’t count on Shinra’s hospitality to actually get a dinner, so to sooth his stress he picked his favorite set from Russian Sushi with a hood of his bright jacket over his head and dark shaded glasses. The disguise helped him and after four year no one expected Orihara Izaya to walk into the restaurant in a broad daylight in a middle of a summer.

At the beginning he feared that Simon, who’s instincts could compete with Shizuo’s , would recognize him but even he smiled at a new patron with a bright smile and a discount coupon pushed into Izaya’s hands. Each bite he was taking as slowly and carefully, savoring a taste for keeping it in his memory for next few years. Tuna was like non other fish. With its flesh not sliding to dissolve inside a mouth but rather to be ripped with incisors and get crushed under a pressure of molars. Even on a plate the fish was fighting. Izaya stared at the last bite between chopsticks, high enough to meet his bored gaze from behind sunglasses. He sighed and throw it back on a plate with chopsticks rolling on a table. With a generous amount of money, that included a tip, under a glass of water he left without a word.

So with that he ended up in Shinra’s new apartment that was more specious than the last one while still being within Ikebukuro Ward. Their greetings small and brief, if a nod from both sides could be counted as a social appropriate greeting of longtime friends. His sisters nowhere to be seen. And Izaya was indeed right because what Shinra offered him was the same brand of green tea he was brewing each time. Izaya sized a steaming mug and with crossed arms fell on a backrest looking at his… friend? Someone he used to know? Stranger? This Shinra was someone completely else and without Celty in… Where was she, once again?

“Where’s your girlfriend?” Izaya asked with a bite into the question.

To that Shinra lift his hand with a gold band on his finger. “My wife” he corrected not being bother by Izaya’s tone. “And she’s out for next few hours, I made sure of it. You missed a lot, Izaya-kun” he added calmly as if firing back.

“My, my” the former informator hummed. “Someone has finally showed their true colors.”

“Everyone are well aware that I will try to protect her from anything.”

“And by that you mean me?” Izaya’s eyes narrowed.

Shinra laughed. “You, Izaya-kun, are no fret. Not anymore” he added as trying to emphasize on long gone days of other’s glory. Izaya pinched his lips tasting on words that had been thrown his way. With nothing added Shinra stood up and with a hand reached to a corridor, he looked at Izaya with eye-brows raised to a hair line. “Shall we?”

For few tense and too silent seconds Izaya was staring at the man in front of him. There was some shadow to his former friend’s eyes. Some darkness that promised unspeakable things. Izaya knew this darkness, he once had it in himself too. With a sighed he raised up back on his feet and with a short distance from the underground doctor, followed down the corridor to a row of rooms. He opened doors wide for Izaya to pass him inside. The room reminded Izaya more like a hospital room than anything else. But taking in a man in a bed brought some unwanted memories. He realized that he was stepping back only when he bumped into Shinra who was staying within doors.

Even if Izaya recognized that face he was not sure if he recognized a person. Some doppelganger or his worst nightmare. The man in the bed was still with closed eyes and forehead unmarred with a scowl. His hair now natural light brown with blonde ends in a bun on a side of his pale cheek slowly covered with stubble. Pale green shirt was laying loose on his shoulders. What was laying in front of Izaya was nothing more than a shell of something he used to fear. Something in him broke letting out what he thought had been lost four years ago. He started to laugh and run to a railing on a side on the bed. He leaned on it hoovering over still form of someone that used to be known as Heiwajima Shizuo.

“He’s so out of it” Izaya laughed while snapping his fingers in front of Shizuo’s face.

“Well as a matter of fact, yes” Shinra said with reluctance. “Completely oblivious to the world.”

“So what’s the problem?” Izaya turned to a man whom he once again can definitely call a friend.

“He is so out of it that someone needs to look after him and take care. Kasuka with his career still ongoing, cannot take him and their parents way too old” he crossed his arms on his chest looking at a wall on the side. “And Celty, being a sweetheart she is, decided that having a patient with an actual doctor under the same roof would be the best decision.”

“So what’s the problem?” Orihara asked once again with his face falling into one of confusion.

“She spends too much time with him” he clicked his tongue with annoyance. “She sometimes braids his hair” he mumbled letting his new cold side slide and replace by his usual jealousy that Izaya saw countless times. “I can guarantee you, that after she will be back tonight, she will shave him!” he pointed at ex-bartender with an accusation.

Izaya’s laughing face fell on his crossed arms on the railing. After his fill only silence was around them. With a sigh he looked up laying a cheek on his arm and looking at sleeping face of Shizuo. The monster’s not so black as he is painted. The human that was in front of him was there to take and do what he pleases. If so…

“So that’s why you contact me?” Izaya asked quietly. “To take him in?”

“That could work if I would be sure you’d not take advantage of this situation” Shinra sat on a plastic chair on the side of bed behind Izaya. “I need you to kill him.”

Izaya turned around in a flash, if not for a metal pipe he was still holding on to, he was sure he would land on his behind. His eyebrows raised in a form of question. Maybe at some point in the past he would have taken the offer but not now.

“You know I cannot kill a human” at his words Shinra’s lips crooked in an amusement. “Don’t” Izaya said with a warning.

“Maybe I should start from the beginning” Shinra waved his hand as if to brushed Izaya’s thinking away. “This isn’t a normal coma. I think the one that actually took your departure the hardest was Shizuo. Don’t ask me why, I wish to know myself” he added seeing a questioning look on ex-informant’s face. “I think it was because of a blame. Most of people think you’ve died that day.”

“Shocker” Izaya mumbled looking back at Shizuo while using his own arms as a pillow.

“After almost two years, he asked for help to let him sleep off some time. Lack of sleep and stress didn’t help on most of wounds he still received from panicked clients he had met. But he wasn’t asking for normal regular sleeping pills. Something that would keep him asleep for month or so” Shinra placed his face on a hand looking at a scene in front of him. To have these two in the same room and still standing was a miracle. “So I took him to my dad” at that words Izaya chuckled. “What?!”

“I wonder what have gone wrong there” Izaya snorted.

“Well, it’d seemed like a good idea in that time. You haven’t seen him like that!” Shinra spit. “So my dad was in one of his new projects. It was called “Nirvana”. It was supposed to put people in comatose-like state for them to recover from traumas. Well it worked on everyone else. That way his patients were able to heal their minds without any stimulants from everyday life” he explained, and to be honest Shinra thought that was a brilliant idea. “So they took regular tests for his pressure, immunity to some drugs and such. And after three weeks, that were the longest they could keep him like that, he didn’t wake up. As a matter of fact he hasn’t woke up since then.”

“And that is?” Izaya asked brave enough to poke Shizuo’s hollow cheek.

“Next month it will be two years” at Shinra’s words Izaya’s finger stilled dipping into Shizuo’s flesh. Shizuo was living, breathing corps. He pulled his hand in a rush.

“And you want me to kill him?”

“Not directly, no. Celty would never forgive me for that” he huffed still annoyed with situation. “I figured out how to entwined someone else conscious with Shizuo’s so they could have the same dream and wake him up.”

“So why me and not someone else?” he asked slowly raising to his feet feeling drained by this whole conversation.

“Well we already had someone else there. That’s why I know that this merge can be made.”

“Who?” Izaya asked crossing his eyes with Shinra.

“Kadota-kun” he answered simply. “But without a success. He was out only for few hours and he said that as soon as he had reached Shizuo he has been executed.”

“Executed?” Izaya asked curiously.

“Well, that was something he didn’t elaborate on.”

After a few second of silence Izaya asked. “And why not someone else?”

“Well” the doctor said sorting his thought and trying to remember pros and cons from couple months ago. “Can you imagine someone else who would take a job? Can you imagine us coming to Kasuka and asking him to kill his own brother? I’m pretty sure it will not end well with this whole Heiwajima tendencies in their family.”

“It couldn’t be that bad” Izaya waved his hand dismissively.

“Oh you have no idea” Shinra snorted looking away from the dark haired man.

“So what makes you think I will be better at waking him up?”

“Because you can adapt” Shinra explained. “Whatever Kadota-kun met it needs someone with quick critical thinking and planning. And let’s be honest, you’re the best out there. You were outrunning him for as long as you two know each other.”

“I’m not sure I would be able to, anymore” Izaya said with stubbornly crossed arms.

“In a realm of dreams no physical conditions should emerge” he explained looking at Izaya with expectation. “So will you take this one last run with Shizuo-kun?”

And with that one month later Izaya was lying in a similar bed in the same room. It took some time for Shinra to get a hold on all necessary equipment and serum from his father. Shingen was more than happy to help, saying that it was exciting to go back to his old projects, especially with such a special case as Shizuo. The only two people who were preparing him to enter Shizuo’s dreams was Shinra and Celty, who now knew about his visit. At the front door she has thanked Izaya for helping Shizuo and flashing so many “I’m sorry” at his face that his eyes were hurting. But with former informant in the matching bed she was silently going over orders Shinra was giving.

“Now let’s go over it once again” Shinra said stabbing a small jar with a syringe and slowly pressing in a piss-looking substance. “You need to get there and kill Shizuo. Theoretically, a connection between his conscious and body should stop. That way he will go into heart arrest that we can save him from.”

“And what about me?” Izaya asked slowly loosing courage for all this madness.

“We will plug you out right after” he said with a smile that was there all that time with Celty in his presence. “Just remember, we’re not sure in what state of mind Shizuo is. Two year could be a long time for him.”

“As if that would be any new revelation” he snorted looking at syringe filled with yellow medicine slowly picking into a peripheral venous catheter in his arm. Both Shinra and Celty took few steps back giving him some space. And with that he felt as if darkness was swallowing him. He turned his head to Shizuo’s profile. Blonde tips of his hair were scattered on his shoulder, mocking Izaya with a new countenance of the man. Two years, huh? “Happy anniversary, Shizu-chan” he let a name slip for the first time in years. “Try to catch me” he added with a mumble when a drossiness hit him like a car.

A car, huh? And that way Izaya ended up staring at the ceiling of Kine’s old black Volvo 940 with his smokes on a dashboard, dusty windows and no one in the car.

*

“Make it as quick as you can, huh?” Izaya hissed under his breath scratching at a rush on his arm under simple linen shirt he had on. “As if that would be so simple.”

After waking up in the old car he left it. There was nothing but bushes and vines around the vehicle. So with car keys (just in case) and his trim furred jacked from a back seat he left to the first city where the civilization would help him locate stupid brute. And through his long walk he needed to admit that Shinra was true to his word. No amount of walking could put pressure on his legs or spine. His fingers could flex without a problem. All that gave him a spring to his pace. But even that small happiness couldn’t prepare him for what he saw after pushing bushes from his way.

He got to a small settlement like a one from historical drama. People walking around with simple clothes in various shades of gray or brown, and their hair pulled in a buns on top of their head while women were walking in short, fit to work kimonos. To say that he was a quitter with a sight of all of it, was underestimation of a year. He needed to hide and fast. He waited for a night to run over city to steal something better to wear. The only problem was his short hair that if he was correct and if his dream Shizu-chan took a stroll in feudal times, were associated with criminals. No need to get some wary stares. He found a straw hat that could cover his head. And how he was supposed to find the blonde in that shithole of all the times Shizuo could have picked out? No internet to search, no distant way of exchange information, nothing.

Blame it on his luck when he found himself in hands of some troublemakers. As they’ve met on the third night in the same time during a break in to one of houses he could assume he found his fellow thefts. And how was Izaya to look gifted horse into its mouth. With a small nod of agreement between them they silently worked together with Izaya more focused on food rather than goods to trade. And with his sleeves filled with rice and some vegetables he found himself pushed to a wall few houses away.

“Who are you!” a bulky man yelled in his face.

“Well your brother in arm” Izaya flashed his teeth with his straw hat falling to a ground. The man looked at his short hair and with a push of his other hand from the wall he nodded.

“It’s not common anymore to find others with Emperor Shizuo collect heads like flowers.”

“Emperor, you say?” Izaya hummed with a mirth.

“He makes a show from every execution” he ruffed with his comrades nodding in agreement behind him. “Welcome aboard. It’s better to stick together” he reached with his hand. Izaya accepted it with his arm and digging his finger into the giant’s elbow. “I’m Tatsuya.”

“The name is Izaya and I hope it will reach the emperor” he said with wide grin. “I wish to meet him as quickly as that’s possible.”

“If you want to lose your life, then be my guest” Tatsuya laughed and his voice boomed into silence of the night.

It took weeks before Izaya could work himself a reputation to pick attention of authorities and reach the emperor. With his help Tatsuya’s group had planned out each crime to a perfection. More and more criminals were joining their ranks seeing a way to get under any punishment that could await them. Each one of them had a life during a day, something low payed and disgraceful, like Tatsuya’s meat stand. Each one of them were keeping their true name and identity a secret but not Izaya. He was bragging in front of soldier while on a run standing on top of a roof of one of low building. He knew that some lines were cheesy and picked out from shows for children he used to watch but always placing his name in it. Each passing week he was aware that his grip on reality was slipping. He knew he needed to get to Shizuo but Shinra’s voice was more distant with reason behind this whole mission.

He left his trademark attire to place with the outfit that could help him blend into a crowd of people waiting for words of their ruler on a market square. The clothes haven’t felt more comfortable then the first day he placed them on his skin. His toes were picking from a rim of straw waraji sandals cutting a delicate skin on more sharp sones. Izaya picked from under his hat but lowered his head right when he saw one of soldiers to turn his way.

“From the son of heaven and eternal ruler of this lands, the Emperor” the offcial’s voice run over the crowd to which Izaya rolled his eyes under his straw cover. “The please has reached the palace and in his generosity, the Emperor, would like to keep peace among his people. So with that, he will send aids to watch over the city. He will not let any of these demons walk the earth…”

“I’ve heard” Izaya overheard one of young women whispering to her friend on the side. “that the emperor is killing everyone even if they claim to be innocent. There is a widow from a next village whose husband had been sentenced to death. The accusation was false and her husband was with other fishermen on a sea when a murder took place. He has been executed the same day they’ve captured him.”

Izaya let the story sink.

*

“How you cannot find him!” Shizuo pushed himself from a throne and with a swift move throw a table through paper thin wall. “Find that pest! Send thousand men, I don’t care!” he paced over the throne room. Long blonde hair were falling out of a bun on top of his head ended with a golden pin. His blue haori looking more like rugs ripped at the bottom and flopping to different sides with each sharp move. Crazed eyes were falling on each of ministers that were bowing with their heads glued to wooden floor.

Incompetence of his court was the downfall he knew has been coming for years. The time before he took over the throne was fuzzy, more like covered by thick fog over a giant pond. He knew it was there but couldn’t point out any other memory than a day of his coronation. He saw a corruption of people within walls of palace. He saw their spoiled hearts and words that were whispered only during night too contaminated with treason to see bright sunlight. He got rid of people who were after him and later who wanted to over throne him. But finally a name mentioned in one of pleas from his people let a rage so whole consuming overtake every though on day and night. “ _I’m gonna kill Izaya_ ” was running over and over sipping all over his skin sticking like a poisonous honey. He never met a man but he knew that he needed to supervise this manhunt.

“Prepare attendants!” he barked stepping on one of officials on his way out. “We’re going to the nearest fort to that damn village!”

*

“It’s bad” Bato assed after his arrival to their hideout. We was on his knees catching his breath, the same way since he barged into rundown place with all of the thieves gathered in a circle. “The emperor with his guards is heading our way. They stayed in Matsumoto Castle for a night and are moving to Yamanaka post.”

“That’s a short distance by horse!” Tatsuya gasped to what Bato acknowledged with a nod. All of them turned to Izaya waiting for another reassuring speech with carefree tone.

But Izaya kept quite and after a moment without even a word all men slowly stood up to leave. The last one was Tatsuya still looking at the short haired man with expectation after their last man closed a door behind them. Izaya was sitting with his legs crossed on a hard ground covered with straw with his elbow propped on a tight and chin on his hand. He was looking ahead with bored expression. That angered Tatsuya, with his jaw clenched he stood up and made a move to the exit.

“Ne, Tatsu-san” he could hear familiar nickname behind his back. “Do you still have my old clothes at your place?” the bulky man turned at the question.

“Why do you need it?” the thief asked not sure if he would like to know.

“I need to dress up for a special occasion, ne?” Izaya asked with a smile not changing his position. “You need to help me with something.”

*

The executions were done day and night. Whoever has been accused of helping Tstsuya’s group that included Izaya has been brought to Yamanaka Fort and after hours of brutal interrogation executed at dawn. Some were saying that the monarch was more like a tyrant that was not listening to pleading convicts. One time demanding from a prisoner a location of Izaya throwing one of the boxes at his feet. From shattered wood rolled a head that rolled righted to condemned man that after seeing empty eyes on it died fimself from stress alone. The manhunt drowned the land in blood that could run as a river with dangerous currant on its own.

“You want to find me that much, Shizu-chan?” Izaya question run through empty forest. In his old dark clothes with his favorite fur trimmed jack at his back he kept flipping car keys on a path he took for the first time after he had arrived into this world of dreams.

He was looking around to spot a mountain of fallen leaves behind bushes. He pushed some branches from a pile uncovering a dusty hood. He moved to a driver’s side and unlock it with a key. He sat down and after putting the key into ignition he tried to start a car. After a shrewish whine from an engine he let it off. He fell down on a backseat in defeat.

“Of course nothing can go according to a plan when it involves you” he hissed looking at the dark dashboard. Only after a second he spotted a pack of cigarettes. Izaya picked it up and opened the box while lowering a window. Inside were few smokes and a lighter. He picked one and fell on a backrest, he made himself comfortable. With a flick of his thumb a fire escaped a metal rim to light end of the cigarette. He took a bitter smoke in and after it expanded in his lungs, let it out with loud exhale. “Tastes horribly” he mumbled and took another hit.

Only after siting in comfortable seat, the closest thing to his own reality, it hit him the grave of the situation. For all those weeks he was making a name for himself once again. Almost standing on a tall building shouting out it out for the blonde to hear. Once again he was hunted by Shizuo that found in himself some mass murderous side. To all ridiculousness he could need a theme song and he was ready to go. He reached a hand to turn on a radio. The bit in a song was making him not his head to it. And then the speaker bragged about the singer to finally say the date of 27th August 2020 and wishing everyone a good weekend ending the audition. Izaya pulled back a crushed filter with cigarette almost gone but before it reached his lips his hands stopped. 27th August… Two weeks since he had fallen asleep. He was HERE for almost two weeks in real life. He stared at the device located on a dashboard. The radio was real, as in from a real timeline. That’s right! He was in a dream. THE dream. Shizuo’s dream. But dream non the less. If it was a dream with cautious mind enough he should be able to bend its physics. He placed a cigarette between his lips inhaling the smoke in while leaning on a stirring wheel. He turned the key in ignition one more time while pumping accelerator.

“Come on, come one” he mumbled with side of his mouth with other occupied by a filter of the cigarette. Starter was yowling with exhaust pipe gaging on fumes. “Start, start” he encouraged the car that finally listened with meters rising with his foot on accelerator flat on the floor. “Yes! That’s it!” he hit a stirring wheel with open palm.

*

Shizuo was leaning on wooden fance, looking at the grounds with yet another captured thief. He hated tugs that were taking from people who were working hard to get their good under scorching sun. Their last executor was leaving after a week of service and another one came to take his place. He was a butcher from a village behind a valley. Whoever would get the job done was fine with Shizuo, though the man was taking too long to sharpen his sword.

“Go on with it!” Shizuo shouted impatiently crushing a wood under his fingers.

“My lord, please!” the peasant whined.

“That’s “Your Highness” “Shizuo barked and after spotting the executor he run his thumb over his neck to rush a new worker.

The butcher lifted the sword over condemned man’s head but before he swung it the screams and loud crash run from a front gate. The wood fell under the metal monster that run in the far end of a fort. Shizuo spotted black haired man picking from out of a window with his arm laying lazily on a dusted metal. The blonde grinned wide with his honey eyes fiercely staring at the raider. He could see carmine eyes stuck on his own form standing at the top of stairs. Their connection broken with a car making a turn and covering square with dust.

“Here you are, Izaya” Shizuo spat feeling his blood boiling. “Throw him into his cell!” Shizuo ordered pointing to the executor and then the prisoner. “Guards!” he shouted at the group right under his balcony. “Get him!” his finger aimed at Izaya who left the car and patiently was sitting on a hood. Izaya let himself be captured but even with lack of resistance pulls and pushes from guards were sharp.

The first day and night he was standing in the middle of grounds bonded with ropes to a pole and surrounded by dozen torches. He was looking around himself trying to pass the darkness of the night. Since morning he had no food nor water and each time he tried to sit or lay on a ground he was sharply pulled back on his feet. The exhaustion was making his vision. He was wondering if sleeping while standing was doable. He had enough of this whole nightmare and was ready to go back leaving Shizuo behind.

“You were hard to find” Izaya heard familiar growl from darkness. He tried to focus his tired eyes to find a source of the voice between torches. White spots on Shizuo’s blue haori and bright long hair could distinguish him from the overwhelming darkness. “Izaya” he added for good measure.

“So you DO recognize me” Izaya chirped trying to find this old courage when he was standing so many times in front of the strongest man of Ikebukuro. “I’m honored, Shizu-chan” he mocked a curtsey the best he could with his trammeled hands.

“Don’t call me that!” Shizuo roared getting pass a ring of fire.

“Why not? I’ve always called you Shizu-chan, why stop now?” Izaya hummed. “My, my, what a brute you turned out to be” he ridiculed. At those words he felt a sharp slap to his cheek and fell down on the sand.

“Keep his mouth shut!” Shizuo shouted and Izaya could see him leaving with blue and white flip of his damaged haori.

Two soldiers run to Izaya’s circle and one of them placed dirty plain rug into him mouth tying a knot at a back of his head to silence him. Izaya with sharp turns to sides tried to prevent them from placing that muzzle but to no vein. And in that way he had been left for a night and whole next day, passing out one time around dawn. His rest hasn’t been disturbed and lack of food and fatigue left him unmoving on a dry sands of a fortress.

The next late evening, he woke up to a clutter of metal armor of soldier falling to one knee in front of approaching Shizuo. His blond hair were swaying at his shoulders with each strong step. Izaya opened his eyes with difficulty, he could feel a sand irritating his eyes. There was a dryness in his throat that not even a swallow of saliva could help with a material between his teeth that was sucking all moisture.

The fire in a torch closes to him illuminated Shizuo’s scowling face, putting a crazed burning in his honey dark eyes. Without Izaya’s ranting they were staring at each other for a long time. With his own face placed flat on a dirt he took Shizuo’s crazed expression in. And he realized that a person standing in front of his was a monster made by a loneliness and filled with madness of ongoing nightmare. Two years in this savage place without few courage enough to reach to him like in their real modern time.

Shizuo passed a ring of fire to slowly but smoothly make his way to lying down man. He reached with his hand and sharply turned Izaya’s to face him. He took in chapped pale lips stretched by a gag, a dirt on his face making a side of his hair brighter with bright brown and bloodshot eyes. But it was not those small red veins that were capturing Shizuo’s attention but rather a russet eyes that were looking at the blonde with a challenge.

“I know your face” Shizuo said quietly. “Though that a heaven placed a trick on me when I saw you yesterday in that chariot of yours” he continued. Izaya tried to pull his face from a hold but that madden the emperor and he reached for a material on Izaya’s cheek and tighten his grip on a material shaking it few times like on a muzzle to force a obedience on an animal. “I saw them for many nights in my nightmares, these eyes!” he hissed through gritted teeth. “With each opponent on a court stricken down your face would invade my dreams. Your bloodied and broken body swaying on a street filled with lights and stone surrounded by a faceless crowd.”

Izaya’s eyes widen with recognition of an event. Shizuo could remember their real lives even if in a misplaced glimpse. Their final encounter engraved on his soul like on Izaya’s. The brunet knew a reason behind his previous doings. His actions always fouled by bitter rejection of their first meeting at school’s field and every other time after. In a path to the revenge for Shinra he turned him into a twisted version of himself. And Shizuo’s first words had been like a bucket of ice cold water poured on his feverish body. Waking him up from a daze. For someone to throw all that bullshit right back at his own face. Of showing him that all that he had become could be seen on him and how far gone he had gone for it to spread around him like an aura. How disgusting it was. He had been a villain of his own story but he couldn’t come back from it. And Shizuo had seen it and tried to chase it away. And deep down Izaya had been grateful for it.

That gratefulness turned into an obsession on how the blonde’s mind functioned. How he senced from a start Izaya’s intentions of using him as his next pawn in Izaya’s game of survivial. He couldn’t classify him as a human. No human could resist his charms and manipulations. So the blonde needed to be some abomination, a monster that could smell on Izaya his own fears, like a rabid dog. His file on Heiwajima Shizuo could contain his whole biography, Izaya dug up every information that had been out there and observed from shadows, but it still lacked a phycological aspect of how the blonde functioned. And that fascination turned to an obsession. Even if unpredictable in his actions Shizuo was obvious in his habits. Of feeding a stray cat living in a card box under a stairs in his ruined apartment building. Of smoking the same brand since last year of high school after experimenting with other tastes of tobacco. Of always finding a time at evenings to chat with Celty while drinking the same brand of strawberry milk. Of every first Friday of a month after finished shift taking a drink in one of bars near Ikebukuro Station. And of always parting with his one night stands picked from said bars with a long chaste kiss even if they’ve never met again. And that last one made Izaya’s insides twist after he had witnessed it for a first time.

The jealousy of someone else experiencing a delicate touch while everything aimed at Izaya was a hard punch with intention to hurt. And for hours Izaya was sitting at a roof of a building on the other side of a street. He has been staring at dark curtains on Shizuo’s bedroom window for it to finally be illuminated with light turned on. He knew about the man more than any of women leaving Shizuo’s tiny apartment. And no amount of his scheming out of Shizuo’s radar could help in the other man at finding him and call on Izaya’s fault at mess around his city. And on few occasions his clothes still reeking of sweet perfumes.

And so had come the last day they’ve seen each other. Izaya knew that he had taken it to extreme when he lighted that one match after hearing a farewell that intended to cut Izaya out for good. The unhealthy addiction that was Heiwajima Shizuo made Izaya push himself to his limit. He had enough and to prove to himself that the blonde was nothing more than a real monster he bet on it his life. He had wanted to show a world that that man of habits drawing people to himself including Izaya, was nothing more than an illusion that has been tormenting Izaya for years. And that would end a life of a person who cared for him from shadows. But even then Izaya failed.

Lying now on a hard ground he tried to say something but a material ball only muffled all his attempts at giving his piece of mind to the emperor looming over his tired useless body. And here they were, once again in from of each other, something Izaya had tried to avoid at all costs in real life. Because he knew that the second time he would turn back to this addiction he would not be able to leave for good as Shizuo had wished. Not when first time after years he could see his face from so close. With being in a range to see few dark brown spots in his focused honey eyes, a straight line of a bridge of his nose and shadow of a stubble on his chin and above his flat lips. This time we would let a match fall to his feet to light both of them up.

Shizuo’s other hand moved to a back of Izaya’s head to bury his fingers in dark hair and jerk his head back. He pushed a restrain dragging a soaked material down Izaya’s chin leaving a wet path. Izaya worked his jaw few times smacking his dry lips, a taste of dust was filling his mouth. The pull on his head was the only force keeping him up.

“Now tell me” Shizuo moved dangerously close with fire from torches reflecting in his eyes. “How do I know you?”

Izaya’s eyes were skipping from one honey iris to the other one. His lips shut tight trying to stop his racing mind from accidently spilling any hint or piece of information. He wasn’t sure what would happen if Shizuo knew about his current life being a fiction. There was no plan behind him actually meeting the man face to face while engaging in any kind of conversation. And that was the first time when instead of enraged beast he actually had a collected man in front of him rationally thinking and interrogating him without any way of escape.

In a turmoil in his head he missed a move of Shizuo’s hand that left a material of a gag and run up to Izaya’s jawline running his fingers with a gentleness that shocked the brunet. Shizuo’s own gaze fixed on his fingers running over pale skin as if a mind of their own. His thumb drew a contour of Izaya’s lower lip grazing a chapped skin of it. He run it on a side tracing a red line from a gag and to his cheek bone. He moved his stare from his finger to look into russet wide opened eyes.

“Is Izaya your real name?” he asked almost a whisper.

Orihara woke up from the moment with a flinch after hearing a question. His lips stretching in a wide smirk once again lowering eyelids into a mocking stare. “Why? Doesn’t it fit my pretty face?” he teased knowing he would only push a wrong button.

Shizuo scowled and with a wide push he throw Izaya on his back. As soon as Shizuo’s hand left his face his whole body rolled on a side as if running after a gentle touch. He was lying on a ground with his cheek flat on harsh sand looking at wide back clad in run-down white-blue haori.

“At dawn we’re moving back to the palace” Shizuo grunted with his back still to laying man. “On this time tomorrow you shall die. Enjoy your last night.”

Izaya fumbled his finger through a dirt to use what left in him to crawl to Shizuo. He reached with his hands to retreating form only for his body failing him and his vision surrounded by darkness. The next thing he would remember were glimpses of pulling him over and pushing on dirty path right into a cage that was too small and even with locks being a simple hasp he had no strength to pull himself from a hard wooden floor of a carriage to move and push a metal lock.

The whole day they spend on their way back to a palace accompanied by a sound of courts musicians in procession. He was at the back but still being heavily guarded. As Shizuo promised him, the sun set down and with their arrival on a main ground they pushed him out of his cage. Two guards pushed him into arms of a peasant who gently helped him stand back on his feet. Izaya looked up to see a familiar face. The man nodded and seeing the same gesture from Izaya he pushed him harshly through the main gate.

Izaya stumbled on his feet on his way down the main square in front of king’s quarters. Officials all in black lined on both sides with their heads low. Right in front of a ornamented balcony there was rolled rice mat that was Izaya’s final destination. At the same time they reached it the blonde emperor emerged from his throne room to step on the balcony. All officials heads fell even lower touching ta stone tiles with their foreheads. Placed all over the plaza. Shizuo was standing there alone leaning on wooden railing. His honey eyes focused on Izaya who had been pushed on his knees.

Izaya looked on a side and saw Tatsuya as the executor preparing his sword. Shizuo started to pace back on forth on a wooden platform. Finally the man bowed to the emperor and turned to the prisoner rising his weapon. They exchange a look and Izaya nodded to Tatsuya. The sword strike with a forced aimed at Izaya throwing the brunet out of his knees. Shizuo run to a wooden balustrade griping a fence under his fingers. A sound of swift slice resonated all over the ground. Izaya’s body fell on a side and was laying on flat tiles in the middle of his court.

Shizuo realized that with a mere order he struck down the only source of answers to all madness that surrounded him from a moment he woke up to a crown placed on his head. Hot coils burned in his chest as if waking up from a slumber of smolder after years. The images from his nightmares were standing in front of his eyes.

The body laying unmoving right in front of him moved with a hood falling over a black hair. In the same moment he saw Izaya raised back on his feet the scenery changed. Like in countless nightmares he had, Shizuo saw the brunet surrounded by gray nameless crowd that surround them.

_Shizuo could feel a phantom of a strain in his muscles while dragging a vending machine behind himself to get closer to Izaya with each step. All bitter feeling of defeat were bubbling in his insides. He could see himself slowly run down a hill in imagination, right into clutches of something dark and terrifying. The monster was waiting for him right at a bottom but a momentum from a gravity only made him run there faster, not able to stop._

_He was tired of the reality that was looking at him with this recent reddish gaze. And what triggered him were Izaya’s words inviting him to begin their final dance. Shizuo could feel a burn consuming him with the same intensity as the one running after him in a narrow tunnel he made for himself on a contraction side to escape raging inferno. He throw the vending machine right at the spot that Izaya has been standing only for the informant to move to a side to dodge a blow. The metal left Shizuo’s grip and with a dark blur he attacked once again with his bare fist. As always Izaya has been quick on his feet to move his body and swing his arm with a blade in his hand to slice Shizuo’s body. Each cut was like justified reason for Shizuo to push himself over his limits._

_He knew what he was to Izaya. Some argument in his twisted equation in the theory of Shizuo being a monster out of control. And he was tired of all of it. Of proving the brunet all over again that he was something more to be acknowledged. He used his strength to protect those in need, gained trust of Izaya’s beloved humans and his hands used for pleasure rather than pain. But nothing was changing the other’s mind. Shizuo had enough. He could burn a world and nothing would change how Izaya was looking at him from a top of a building. Resentful red eyes burning Shizuo’s insides. He throw a punch for it to land on fragile bones of Izaya’s arms._

_There was an electric lamp that he saw Izaya has leaned on to keep a balance. The brunet pushed himself from it to make few steps looking at him with a final resolve burning in his eyes. And even if dragging a vending machine behind him Shizuo knew he couldn’t let a final strike fall on a fragile body swaying on sides with arms that were disfigured. Everything he was doing in his life was to prove that he was not a monster that everyone accused him to be. And even in that last moment he saw defeat in Izaya’s eyes. But not bitter accusation in his eyes of a victim but rather someone who knew that he had fallen to his own fate. Someone who would embrace death as if awaiting a long awaited friend._

_And then Vorona stepped in, stripping Shizuo of the only thing he could give Izaya._

Shizuo saw Izaya swaying in the same way he used on streets of a distant city. He pulled a gag down and reached to a box offered by the executor. The treason from all people gathered didn’t surprise Shizuo, everyone has been lying him from the start. This whole world was a lie. Izaya pulled a gun with a handle finished with fine dark red wood. And the dark haired man was aiming at Shizuo. The blonde was waiting. If he couldn’t give Izaya a monster than he would at least fall as one. Izaya was aiming right at his head gazing at honey eyes. He lowered the gun few inches.

“Wake up” Izaya yelled and fired.

The force from a gun shook Izaya’s arm pulling at his shoulder. He saw Shizuo’s body fall back. That was it. A moment so floating and brief. All court around him fall silent with Tatsuya still on one knee. Time froze for a second only for a ground to shake. Earth shuddered under Izaya’s feet. All building started to fall apart. Izaya turned around only to see bodies of officials and Tatsuya’s perish in a black smoke. What fell from building turned into a dark cubes spilling over dirt. Shizuo’s dream world started to fall apart.

Izya run to fallen body on top of balcony using a staircase on the side. Every second step was falling under his foot. He throw himself from a last step crumbling under his weigh. He slide near laying blonde to reach him after a short crawl not depending on his legs. He grabbed a tan face in his hands while desperately muss bright fuzz. He run his hand how to Shizuo’s chest right at its center. Dark blood was sipping from between his ribs where Izaya couldn’t feel a beat of his heart. His shaking hands moved back to his face turning it his way with red smudge on Shizuo’s jawline.

“We’ll wake up” Izaya nearly whispered close to Shizuo’s face hoping it would be heard all over the chaos around them. “You will wake up. And me too” he swallowed trying to moisture his dried throat. “And I will tell you how you pissed me off, that first time” he shook a pale cheek. “You dumb protozoan” he huffed with a smile. He moved his body closer resting Shizuo’s weight on his own chest. “I will tell you how you pissed me off every time. How it still pisses me off when you’re right!” he shouted over a wind gathering all black ash around them. “You hear me?!” he pushed blonde head to his chest turning his eyes to dark sky. “But we need to wake up!”

The whole palace turned into a desert of dark sand roaming around Izaya. Building were falling under their wight, people all over ground already gone. The black tornado slowly tighten around the two of them, obscure sight of a horizon. Izaya curled around Shizuo’s face trying to protect him from the chaos.

_“We’re losing him! Prepare a defibrator!” Shinra screamed Celty’s way while looking at confused honey gaze form the other bed. “Izaya! Wake up!” Shinra hissed pushed at his chest while Celty put flat pats all over Izaya’s ribcage. Shinra brushed her off and pushed a button of the device laying on pale green sheets. A machine loudly announced of an upcoming impulse._

“But you need to wake up, you hear me? You need to wake up” he mumbled into fallen emperor’s ear. “You need to wake up, Shizu-chan” he sobbed feeling sand whipping at his back. It run up his clothes ripping at his skin. He gritted his teeth feeling warm blood running down his back. Pressure crawling at his skin started to crush it while ripping it away from his spine. “Shinra!” Izaya yelled with his back bending to throw his wail in a narrow tunnel above them.

_“Izaya” Shinra hissed pumping trying to restart Izaya’s heart. He looked behind himself where Celty was trying to push Shizuo back into his bed. In between aimed pressures he looked at pale face of his friend. “You need to come back to us, you moron!” he looked up at a flat line on a screen right above Izaya’s bed. It stated that way for too long. “Celty! We’re loosing him!”_

The darkness consumed Izaya ripping Shizuo’s body from his arms.


End file.
